Shrubs lianoid, low, 0.3–1.5 m tall. Branchlets brownish to dark brown, terete, villous, unevenly with purplish red glandular hairs and bristly, sometimes with sparse, needle-like prickles. Leaves simple; petiole 4–8 cm, villous, with purplish red glandular hairs; stipules free, 1–1.5 cm, palmatipartite; lobes linear or linear-lanceolate, villous, with glandular hairs; blade suborbicular or broadly ovate, 6–14 cm in diam., abaxially thinly tomentose, with intermixed long hairs and sparse, glandular hairs along veins, glabrescent, adaxially villous, with sparse, intermixed glandular hairs along midvein, base deeply cordate, margin distinctly 3–5-lobed, lateral lobes broadly triangular, apex obtuse or acute, terminal lobe slightly larger than lateral lobes, broadly triangular-ovate, margin unevenly coarsely sharply serrate, apex acute or shortly acuminate. Inflorescences terminal or axillary, subracemes, 5–20-flowered, terminal ones 8–13 cm, lateral ones shorter; rachis, pedicels, and abaxial surface of calyx villous and with purplish red glandular hairs; bracts 0.8–1.2 cm, palmatiparted; lobes linear, villous, with glandular hairs. Pedicels unequal in length, longer ones to 2.5 cm, shorter ones 5–6 mm. Flowers 1–2 cm in diam. Calyx tube cupular, ca. 5 mm; sepals erect in fruit, narrowly triangular-lanceolate, 7–12 × 3–5 mm, apex long acuminate and deeply divided into 2 or 3 lanceolate lobes. Petals white, broadly obovate, 6–7 mm, base barely clawed. Stamens ca. 5 mm; filaments linear. Pistils many, much longer than stamens; ovary glabrous. Aggregate fruit red, subglobose, glabrous; pyrenes distinctly rugose. Fl. May–Jul, fr. Aug–Sep.

Sparse montane forests and thickets; 200--1200 m. Anhui, Fujian, Guangdong, Guangxi, Hunan, Jiangxi, Zhejiang.